jena 6 free! r/p

“After more than two years of protesting, writing phone calls and thousands of people descending on Jena, Louisiana, to protest this outrageous retro Jim Crow case, the Jena 6, Jesse Ray Beard, Carwin Jones, Robert Bailey, Theo Shaw, Bryant Purvis and Mychal Bell are all free to move ahead with their lives.

The five remaining Jena 6 cases were brought to a conclusion last Friday when Beard, Jones, Bailey, Shaw, and Purvis pleaded “no contest” to misdemeanor simple battery charges.

They will spend no time in jail, serve seven unsupervised days on probation, and were fined $500 and court fees.

It’s a remarkable outcome considering the Jena Six were originally and outrageously charged with attempted murder in this small Louisiana town with a racist past for what basically was a schoolyard fight provoked by nooses hung in a tree.”